Remove the Monuments ?
RIA Novosti reports about the ongoing discussions between Russia and Estonia over monuments commemorating fallen Soviet soldiers on Estonia’s territory.
RIA Novosti writes:
KHANTY-MANSIISK, March 23 - Relations between Russia and Estonia could be seriously damaged by the removal of a monument to Soviet soldiers in Tallinn, the Russian foreign minister said Friday.
The six-foot high “Bronze Soldier” and other Soviet-era memorials have in recent years become rallying points for ethnic Russians, and clashes with Estonian nationalists near the bronze monument prompted the Estonian authorities to press for monuments “dividing society” to be removed.
“These actions will seriously harm Russian-Estonian relations,” Sergei Lavrov told a news conference. “We would like to avoid it, but we believe it is necessary that organizations where Estonia is a member, including the EU, NATO and OSCE, must voice their protest against such steps.”
Russia has long accused Tallinn of encouraging Nazism and discrimination against ethnic Russians, and even prompted debate on possible sanctions against Estonia.
But Estonia’s commission on wartime burials recommended March 13 removing the monument, which is part of a Soviet-era memorial, from central Tallinn to a “quieter” military cemetery, and Prime Minister Andrus Ansip announced yesterday the start of the preparation for the removal.
Some 50,000 Soviet troops perished in Estonia in 1944 when Russia liberated it from Nazi Germans and regained control of the republic, which many Estonians call Soviet occupation. The bodies are buried in 450 cemeteries and memorials across the country.
In Germany people fail to understand the fuzz that is there about the monuments for the fallen Soviet soldiers in Estonia. There are plenty of monuments on Germany’s soil commemorating the soldiers of the Red Army who lost their lives “on the road to Berlin” and during the extensive fighting that took place on German soil in the final days of World War 2.
A continuous and friendly relationship exists beween the “Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge e.V.” , a German NGO taking care of German wargraves from the Arctic to the deserts of Northern Africa and from Normandy to Siberia, and the Russian authorities. Both sides take care that German wargraves are maintained and respected in Russia.
On the other hand German authorities take care of Russian / Soviet graves located on German territory. Germany contributes to the maintenance of Russian / Soviet memorials on German soil.
But not only German officials and NGOs are taking care of Russian / Soviet war graves, individual Germans do so on a voluntary and “unoffical” basis as well.
In Düsseldorf, my hometown, exists a tiny memorial commemorating Soviet POWs who died in captivity in a nearby hospital. These Soviet POWs had been forced to work in Nazi Germany’s armament industry and had deceased from various diseases and malnutrition, as well as from the terrible working conditions they had to stand.
Although living in Düsseldorf for some 18 years now I just recently learnt about this tiny memorial and decided to go and see it. It is a hewn rock and its inscription mentions, in Russian as well as in German, the number and the nationality of those it commemorates.
While walking around this memorial I noticed an elderly lady who removed moss and foliage from it, carefully cleaning it with a handbrush. While doing this she apparently talked to the memorial as if it were a living individual. I couldn’t help but watch her doing this for quite some time.
When she packed her bag and got prepared to leave the site I addressed her and told her how much it touched me to see her working there.
Well, she said, my older brother, who was my dearest, perished in the course of the battle at Kursk / Russia in August 1943.
For decades I didn’t know where he was buried and whether he had received a decent burial and rests in a worthy grave or not.
Via the “Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge e.V.” I finally learnt that he is buried in a small village near Kursk and that his grave is maintained and looked after by the local population. I feel like returning this kindness by looking after this memorial here. It’s like rendering a service to my brother.
Vilhelm Konnander of “Vilhelm Konnander’s Weblog” has dedicated an entry on his blog to the bizarre situation in Estonia in February this year already. It is called “Estonia: Battle by Bronze Proxy” and is a read I would like to suggest to you.
Germany considers the fallen soldiers, burried in her soil, being her dead. Regardless which country they came from. In my oppinion the dignity and honour of a country or nation can be judged by the way it treats the dead.
How about you Estonia ? The fallen Soviet soldiers buried in your soil have long become your dead already.
Honour and respect them the way you want to be respected yourself.
[...] Federazija looks at the Russian-Estonian dispute over the WWII monument from a German perspective. Veronica [...]
From what we see in the Russian media the Germans don’t have that much freedom (in Kantian terms) to choose. Having in mind Germany-Russian treaty, in which the German obligation is stipulated as well as principle of reciprocity, that is if you want your graves in Russia to be kept, keep Russian graves in Germany. We have none of them.
On the other hand we have about 8% of population made of Russian citizens, another 10% of population made of former USSR citizens who decided not to take their Russian citizenship (the stateless persons) as well as about up to another 10% of our proper citizens made of naturalized newcomers from Russia.
Thus, it is both question of external and internal affairs, because we have - uncomparable to any country except Latvia and Ukraine - substantial Russian minority, we have significant difference of opinions as well as legally unresolved issues with Russia, we have not - unlike Germany - formally lost any wars and thus we aren’t bound by too many treaties. The situation is different in different circumstances and as such needs case-by-case treatment.
Sorry, I removed my previous comment as I somehow gained the impression that you were from Ukraine. I apologize.
Still I have to ask the question “You have none of what?”
No wargraves ? No treaties ? With who ? With Germany, with Russia ?
Do we necessarily need formal treaties to respect the dead ?
It would reflect very poor credit upon Estonia if the basic respect for graves and memorials depended on formal treaties and not on the fundamental values of a civilized nation.
Respect, my friend, is something one cannot demand. Your country is obliged to show respect, by the virtue of the treaties, signed with regard to German Unification - take a look at the russkaja pressa. That is exactly what I said.
In our case, however, disrespect is mutual. I am not going to burden you with examples, but it is clear in my mind that fundamental values of civilized nations should work both ways.
No, respect can be demanded. It has something to do with dignity and civilisation.
Your remark regarding the German reunification leaves the impression that Germany, in your opinion, seems to be obliged to bend back- and forward eternally for her past. This is not the case.
There is nothing such as an eternal and inheritable guilt. The present day Russians aren’t responsible for the former USSR, just like the present day Germans aren’t responsible for the Nazi dictatorship.
Shouldn’t you have realized this, then you have obviously no idea what a mature democracy is all about and live in a different reality.
Germany went through a process of development in the last 60 years, leading to the conclusion that one can only live together with one’s neighbours peacefully and prosperously when respecting them. Germany is now a mature and confident democracy. How about Estonia ?
Your subliminal message suggests that you, and you are hopefully not speaking for entire Estonia, haven’t learned that lesson yet.
Somehow I gained the impression that the entire debate about the memorial is driven by nationalism only and a subconciously felt urge for revenge for decades of Soviet rule. The NATO and EU memberships aren’t designed to provide “backup” for the settlement of any cold case Estonia might feel to still have to settle with Russia.
As to the virtue of treaties, bare in mind that Estonia has also signed treaties. Or were you forced at gun point to join the EU ? No, I don’t think so. By signing the accession treaty Estonia took the obligation and the responsibility to live up to the spirit and the values of the European Union. And this contains respect.
And as to the mutual disrespect, I think that in some aspects the Baltic states seem to disrespect Russia more than vice versa and seem to think that EU- and NATO- membership provide a safe umbrellar to comfortably do so. That would be an error. Russia can’t be excluded form the process of bringing stability and security for entire Europe. And Europe should not, and will not, let unnecessary quarrels hinder this process.
And a quarrel about a 6 feet tall bronze soldier is as useless and unnecessary as a pimple on my rear end.
Friend, I am sure you know more about Germany that I do. I cannot miss that you also probably command good Russian, an impressive combination, so it would hopefully compensate the lack of in depth comprehension of the EU affaires. If it is true that Germany is obliged by the treaty signed with USSR in 1990 to maintain Soviet war graves then it deprives that country of freedom to choose between good and bad and therefore it cannot be seen virtuous.
There are plenty of monuments on Germany’s soil commemorating the soldiers of the Red Army who lost their lives “on the road to Berlin” and during the extensive fighting that took place on German soil in the final days of World War 2.
Am I showing respect to society by not robbing banks? Or am I simple afraid the police would catch me? It is simple matter of following the rules. In particular case - rules of international treaty. If you want to call following a treaty as some kind of unseen and unheard deed, fine. But we have a treaty with Finland so we gave up part otf our territorial sea. It is a treaty, we have it deposed at the UN and so on. Let’s assume your country hasn’t given up any of it territorial sea. Why not? Greed? Nationalism? Can we say, based on that we have been less selfish and agreed to permit more free traffic and your country didn’t, that your country is less not civilized (and we are more civilized)? Does not sound convincing, is it?
As for the guilt, you caught me by surprise with this one. I’d leave out the whole guilt part, but one thing is true - losing a war makes you following the rules other enforce on you. In the basis of the modern German state today (as well as Japanese) - I am sure we would not even have to use wikipedia to find out - a lot has been installed as direct consequence of that historical fact.
Your remark regarding the German reunification leaves the impression that Germany, in your opinion, seems to be obliged to bend back- and forward eternally for her past. This is not the case.
And yes, it is the case. If there’s a treaty in force at the moment it stands and if it has no expiration date it will stand. Forever, unless changed. It is as simple as that.
As to the virtue of treaties, bare in mind that Estonia has also signed treaties. Or were you forced at gun point to join the EU ? No, I don’t think so. By signing the accession treaty Estonia took the obligation and the responsibility to live up to the spirit and the values of the European Union. And this contains respect.
Well, treaties are pretty legal things. I am glad that respect is included in EU treaties. Though EU treaties do not extend outside EU. Simple fact - Italian textiles and shoes are imported duty free, while China recently received trade sanctions. Perhaps we don’t respect Chinese workers and businessmen as we do Italian? Who deserves more respect, dead or alive?
There’s mechanism included to enforce EU treaties. If part of the treaty isn’t followed, it is taken to the EU Commission which then starts proceedings againt the state, failing to implement the treaty, If the member state doesn’t start implementing it, it is then taken to the European Court of Justice (or EC of First Instance in some cases). The court then rules. Currently there’s about 20-30 cases potentially being forwarded to the European Courts. One of them is in telecommunications - has been mentioned in international press, as well as in the Russian media (I bet you can yandex it). I guess we have failed to show enough respect to the users of mobile telephones. To cut this short, I think it is difficult to figure out what exactly you want to say under your understanding of respect. Clear though, there’s no such thing as respect in international treaties. Once you put something like “respect”, “virtue”, “faith”, “love”, “compassion” in writting it turns into “showing off”, “goodwill”, “religion”, “family” and “charity”, exact transformation depending on circumstances. In some countries you can legally buy love.
I think we’ve got enough good old German philosophers explaining to us the difference, so we’d be wise to pay some respect- in this case it would be in the true meaning of this word - and just note this distinction.
[...] my previous entry on this topic, “Remove the Monuments ?” , I have pointed out my view on this affair and tried to highlight the general view in Germany on [...]
Kant, on freedom (wording cloise to original from the explanation of Kant’s works). Freedom must be understood as the will’s ability to determine autonomously what the person choses to do. Birds /../ may well experience few constraints on the execution of their chosen actions than humans do, but to call their action “chosen” is seriously misleading. Anymals lack rationality and consiquently lack autonomy. The causes of their actions are external to them.
Here we determine several external actions. On Germany as legal entity: reported provisions of a treaty with USSR to protect war graves, condition of German unification. This is in essence perpetual obligation of the legal person called German Federation (question though whether it is seriously binding). Secondly, understanding and post-war ideology among the people, initially imposed by the will of the societies, which were German sovereigns for some period. It does not mean that this understanding or ideology, or the the legal provisions are “bad”, it is nowhere claimed by me. It means exactly as stated - Germany has not freely chosen its cause, but it was shaped, heavily, by circumstances, therefore even probably continously “correct” has no moral highground. Of course, we can also take the different view of some liberal philosophers, who determine freedom more by the actions/deeds (outside of person) and not so by the will (inside of person), but again, liberal philosophy has less accent on morality. If it would say that particular actions and opinion - once undertaken - are more likely to qualify as free, but then we may discover that it would refuse to extend it to the outside or to connect moral value to them. Because, as said, it is liberal philosophy.
Note that Kant is hardly nationalist and he is recognized as philosopher even by hardline Marxists, even though they claim to “develop and improve the flaws” in his teachings.
Hallo, Herr Deutscher!
I would just like to make few comments regarding your approach on the issue. It is a good thing that there is a person from Germany who possesses 5 foreign languages, but as we see it might not be enough to obtain all the necessary information to make reasonable conclusions on issues.
First of all you seem to use such formula: Estonian nationalists=Estonians, which is obviously not true. Otherwise I would remind how often there are Nazi demonstrations in contemporary Germany (and also Russia), while there has been none in Estonia. There is just not enough support in the society, if there were, the developments in Estonia in the last 15 years would have been the opposite. Why not ask, why this statue is still standing if we’re such nationalist people.
Secondly, there is only one party in the parliament which has called for removal of the statue, while the main political agenda discusses on moving it into the more appropriate place. And if you do not know why the place is not appropriate then you just have not been there. If it is a war grave (in which we can not be sure, but it will be found out in this spring) it will be moved, and not “removed”. And if you refer to international obligations, then in this case moving the burial site is the obligation of Estonian government under its obligations taken by conventions it has joined.
If it is not a war grave and there is nobody buried under it, then it is just a Soviet statue. Therefore it should not considered to be a big issue, especially by Russian Federation where also this type of memorials have been just lately been removed without any discussion. Secondly, if it is not a war grave would you still consider it “nationalist” to remove a statue for occupation forces? There has been long discussion in Estonia that there should be memorial for those who lost their lives in the WWII, on both sides. Estonian history is complex on this period but which is certain, and also accepted by the general public, is that soldiers fought in that war should be commemorated. Thou either side should never be glorified, as for Estonian people (not ethnic Estonians) this war was a tragedy, it wiped out most of the minorities we had before.
As an Estonian widely known proverb goes: “The dead will not be judged”, and I would only add that “..but the their deeds will”. I would consider it even healthier approach than the one that is often given to German Nazi history by many people in the “West”.
Hello,
First of all I would like to say I am an Estonian and my personal opinion is very different from the following why the “Bronze Soldier” should be moved but I will tell it from the moral perspective - First of all, It stands in the center of the town, there is a bus stop right beside it, dogs occasionally urinate near it on the trees (under one of witch there supposedly is a body - but that is still unconfirmed ). Where is the respect for the dead in that? Shouldn’t the dead rest in peace?… Or are there some weird traditions in the Russian culture I don’t understand that lets it be ethical to let their fallen war heroes be buried under a bus stop and peed on by dogs every once in a while. I think the local Russian community should be happy about the plans to move the bodies and the monument to a more appropriate and peaceful place like a graveyard for an example. Russians themselves tear down Soviet monuments to fallen heroes without warning in the cold of night, we are just planning to move it to a better, less offensive place for both sides and suddenly we are fascists? Where is logic in that?
It is so unbelievable illogical to remove monuments that remind us of the suffering and wrongdoing that has to never be repeated again. The Estonian government should be more careful in their actions, since this is a clear sign of nazim and beliefs of superiority.
This small country cannot survive without an open Economy and trade from Russia.
How is removing a Soviet memorial which for Estonians is a constant reminder of almost 50 years of ILLEGAL OCCUPATION, repressions and mass-deportations to Siberian work-camps “a clear sign of nazism”? Are thereonly 2 options? Anti-communism (or Stalinism) = nazism? If so which one are you?
The simple fact is that both of those ideologies were seriously wrong (even though communism looked rather ok on paper, at least in it’s original form). Take it from someone who knows, in practice COMMUNISM IS JUST AS BAD AS NAZISM.
The cause to remove the monuments is the yearly increase in conflicts between the Estonian nationalist-idiotic movement and the soviet fanatics. The main reason the conflicts started is the 9th May celebrations of soviet victory of WWII and it is very, i repeat, very dangerous to walk there at that day while speaking Estonian. The Russians laugh at the Estonian people through that monument by making racist comments every time they hold a meeting there. They provoke us time and time again, how long can we take this abuse by Russians and do nothing because were scared of our “big neighbor”. This madness and humility must end sometime, but if we raise our heads and offer peaceful solutions the Russians call us fascists and make false and offensive propaganda towards our nation.
hi again. I had some new thoughts about fascism when walking my town these days.
I’ve always considered myself tolerant towards every human being and yadda yadda. but if fascism is moving a piece of bronze to a cemetery andnot throwing Molotovs in the bars and beating people up on the grounds of their national identity… then I might be a fascist, too.
nice PR indeed. I wonder if local Russian community is able to condemn the riots - if not for any other reason, then because much of the property destroyed today and yesterday belonged to Russians.
Heribert Schindler wrote: “I think that in some aspects the Baltic states seem to disrespect Russia more than vice versa…”
This truly bizarre contention hints at some of the reasons why Germans have such difficulty understanding these issues. As the eminent historian Andrew Ezergailis recently wrote re disinformation: “why is it that after the smoke of WWII has cleared, or should have cleared, there are numerous well educated and clever people who think that the people who lived between Germany and Russia, those people who were conquered, economically exploited, disarmed (yes! disarmed), deported, and murdered by the million, by either or both of the imperial powers, end up being considered the real murderers and evildoers of the Twentieth Century. My emphases is on them rather than us, although I am fully aware that in this situation there is a risk of confusing object with subject. I have come to suspect this absurdity happened because the rhetoric and sources of historical texts, the Holocaust in particular, have been in the hands of both imperial powers. I have also come to conclude that it was the Nazi who blessed us with the most ingratiating line. It penetrated the minds of the victors and the vanquished, the victims and the torturers, the devils and the angels.”
Germany, one of the two aggressors responsible for the carnage in the Baltic states, was utterly defeated and denazified (a process which took place primarily in the Federal Republic, of course). It has faced its history. A recent example of how this is a continuing, practical process is the compensation paid to some surviving forced laborers.
Russia, the successor state of the USSR, has never faced its history, and that fact is invariably at the very heart of issues like that of the Bronze Soldier.
The Baltic states, devoured by Stalin and his friend Hitler, were victims and not aggressors.
To speak of a supposed Baltic disrespect for war dead is a calumny. As Vladimir Socor observed: “The site was not treated as a war grave during the occupation era; indeed, it was and is located at a busy traffic intersection downtown. More recently, Soviet nostalgics sought to re-define the site as a war grave in hopes of staving off its relocation and that of the monument. Indicative of Soviet Russian authorities’ disdain for the lives of their troops, the possible military grave around the monument was not certified or documented.”
What Estonia is doing is demonstrating a respect for the dead that the Soviets lacked. This is by no means the only such example — at my blog, I describe a grave in a park here in Daugavpils which probably does not contain the remains of the soldiers ostensibly buried there.
Balts have always respected graves, regardless of the identity of the dead. This is in marked contrast to the Soviets, who demolished cemeteries with regularity. The main street in Daugavpils, for example, is partly paved with the headstones of Jews, whose cemetery was bulldozed during the occupation. The hill holding the corpses of the Poles who liberated Daugavpils from the Bolsheviks in 1920 was turned into a quarry and then a trash dump. Legionnaires’ graves are still routinely vandalized.
Whilst the Russians rarely demonstrated respect for the dead, they were exceedingly interested in using the dead for propaganda purposes. One can now find echoes of this propaganda all over the Internet — my favorite absurdity thus far is a fake picture of the missing Alyosha paired with a photo of the Buddha destroyed by the Taliban, attempting to equate these events.
In Latvia (which cannot demolish “victory monuments” because of the agreement it signed to get Russia to withdraw its soldiers) as in Estonia, some of these places have become shrines and podiums for revanchist, red-brown elements. This imbues them with a symbolism that is hard for Balts to take — and there’s the rub; what is significantly different between the German case and the Baltic one is that Nazi Germany waged a criminal war and lost. Gott sei dank.
You would not expect Prague to host triumphalist Nazi statuary, and the presence of such would be particularly appalling if Germany were officially to deny that the occupation of the Czech lands ever took place. Viktor Kalyuzhny, Russia’s Ambassador to Latvia, regularly and vociferously denies that Latvia was occupied. That is the official Kremlin line.
One need only peruse the noise on the Internet to see who respects whom — I lost count of how many times Russians referred to Estonia as “nothing.” Rioters in Estonia set fire to the statue of an Estonian patriot a couple of nights ago.
I don’t see what sort of respect “nothing” can offer to the unrepentant power that that still subscribes to a distorted historiography.